VOLUMEVOLUME XVI, XXXV, NUMBER NUMBER 4 3 FALL SUMMER 2000 2019

Quarterly Publication of the Culinary Historians of Ann Arbor

Eastern Europe, West of the Alleghenies

Immigrant of Steel Country, Part 1

Photo: Library of Congress LC‐USZ62‐56634

Children make their way to school in Homestead, PA, on July 5, 1907, with houses and steel mills in background.

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 MORSELS & TIDBITS

Curated by Elizabeth A. Williams, “Gorham Silver: Prof. of History), who spoke to CHAA in 2014 and 2018, is part Designing Brilliance 1850–1970” is running at the Museum of of the Editorial Collective that took over the editing of the Rhode Island School of Design (Providence, RI) from May 3 Gastronomica this year. to December 1, 2019 and will later travel to the Cincinnati Art Museum and The Mint Museum (Charlotte, NC). This museum “ at the Univ. of Michigan: Then and Now” was a has the largest collection of ware from the Gorham Mfg. seminar for first-year UM students last Fall semester, taught by Company, which was established in Providence in 1831, and Anthropology Lecturer Lisa Young. The is described in rose to become the largest silver company in the world. Creating an article by Emily Buckler, “From Page to Plate: Uncovering everything from commissioned presentation pieces to show- Food History through Primary Source Documents”, in the 2019 stoppers for the dining room, it put uniquely American design on issue of the UM Library’s magazine, The Connector. To uncover the international stage. historical trends in eating at UM, the class used archival materials from the UM Bentley Historical Library and the Janice Bluestein On June 9, CHAA member Dr. Margaret Carney (Director Longone Culinary Archive (UM Library Special Collections), of the International Museum of Dinnerware Design) gave a new ranging from cookbooks more than 100 years old to fraternity and and improved version of her talk about Well of the Sea (1948- sorority banquet menus. A team led by UM Dining 1972) to the Culinary Historians of Chicago— appropriately de John Merucci recreated an array of the dishes for enough, since the acclaimed seafood restaurant was located in consumption by the class and by other students at South Quad one Chicago. Dr. Miranda Brown (UM Prof. of Chinese Studies), evening in early October. Examples included chicken fricassee who gave a talk, “Of Cheese and Curds in China”, to CHAA last with mashed potatoes and a side of pineapple salad. January, has a research article in the Summer 2019 issue of the journal Gastronomica (19:2), “Mr. Song’s Cheeses: Southern Using archival collections from throughout Canada’s China, 1368-1644”. Dr. Helen Zoe Veit (Michigan State Univ. Maritime provinces, Lyn Bennett (Dalhousie Univ.), Edith

Snook (Univ. of New Brunswick), and a team of research assistants have compiled published and manuscript recipes from before 1800 to create a searchable Early Modern Maritime Recipes Database (https://emmr.lib.unb.ca). The entries include digitized images of the original recipes, transcriptions, ISSN 1552-8863 explanatory notes, and essays. The recipes are largely the works Published quarterly by the of English-speaking men, but some are in French, German, or Culinary Historians of Ann Arbor (CHAA) Latin, and a number were recorded or compiled by English- speaking women. Submissions of additional recipes http://culinaryhistoriansannarbor.org/ are encouraged. An archive is available at https://cooks.aadl.org/cooks/repast The UK publisher Bloomsbury, which inaugurated the Editor……………….…….…..……Randy K. Schwartz journal Global Food History in 2014, is now launching a CHAA President…………Mariam Van Deventer Breed monograph series focusing on food from the late 18th Century to CHAA Program Chair...……………Laura Green Gillis the present. The series highlights the nutritional, social, political, CHAA Treasurer………..…………..……Dan Longone cultural, and economic transformations of food around the globe. CHAA Membership Secretary ……….Marionette Cano The editors are committed to publishing manuscripts that feature CHAA Website Editor…..………………….Judy Steeh geographical areas currently underrepresented in English- CHAA Founder and Honorary President…Jan Longone language publications, particularly Africa and Asia. For more

 information, contact the series editors, Amy Bentley of New York Univ. ([email protected]) and Peter Scholliers of Vrije The material contained in this publication is copyrighted. Universiteit Brussel ([email protected]). Passages may be copied or quoted provided that the source is credited.

For submissions or inquiries about Repast, contact: Upcoming food history conferences:

 Sep. 2-6, 2019: “A Feast of the Senses: European Food and Randy K. Schwartz History 18-20th Centuries”, in Albi, Tarn, France. Organized 1044 Greenhills Drive by the International Commission for Research into European Ann Arbor, MI 48105-2722 tel. 734-662-5040 Food History (ICREFH). [email protected]  Oct. 18-19, 2019: “At the Medieval Table: Cooking, Cultures & Customs”, at Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ). Subscriptions are $20/year. To subscribe to Repast or to Organized by Rutgers and by Mens et Mensa: Society for the become a CHAA member (which includes a subscription), Study of Food in the Middle Ages. contact either President Mariam Breed (tel. 734-320-3708)  Nov. 15-16, 2019: “(Post)Colonial Foodways: Creating, or Membership Secretary Marionette Cano (e-mail Negotiating, and Resisting Transnational Food Systems”, the [email protected]), or download a sixth annual Amsterdam Symposium on the History of Food, membership form from the web address given near the top at the Aula of the Univ. of Amsterdam. Organized by the of this box. university’s Special Collections Library.  2

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

SESQUICENTENNIAL OF THE HEINZ COMPANY

Our focus on immigrant foods of Steel Country is inspired, in part, by this year’s 150th anniversary of Henry J. Heinz’s first food-packing business, which he started in Sharpsburg, PA, near Pittsburgh. The year 2019 is also the 175th anniversary of Heinz’s birth, the 150th anniversary of his marriage, and the 100th anniversary of his death.

Henry John Heinz was born near Pittsburgh to parents who had emigrated from Germany. (Interestingly, his father, John Henry Heinz, from the village of Kallstadt, was a second cousin of fellow Kallstadt immigrant Friedrich Trump, paternal grandfather of President Trump.) Henry’s mother, Anna, kept a household garden beside the brickyard in Sharpsburg that her husband John managed for a living. Henry was reportedly as young as 8 years old when he began to ply the streets of Sharpsburg selling surplus produce from the garden and developing a list of customers. At age 12 he began to use a horse-drawn wagon for the burgeoning business, and at 25 he Henry John Heinz and his wife, Sarah Sloan Young (“Sallie”) Heinz. and a partner formally launched a commercial line of canned and Image: http://www.johnheinzlegacy.org. bottled foods, starting with pickled horseradish. By the 1890s the H. J. Heinz Company was already marketing products overseas, and by the 1910s it had more than 20 processing plants in the U.S.

The “57 Varieties” that made Heinz world-famous included several types of olives like those being bottled in the photo at right. In 1909 Elizabeth Butler, a pioneering Progressive Movement social investigator who studied the Heinz facilities and other canning factories in Pittsburgh, wrote that the task of pickle-bottler was one of the most physically demanding and lowest-paid jobs there. It was typically filled by young Slavic women whose families had immigrated to the region from urban areas in Europe. A 12-hour workday was standard in U.S. industry at the time. Butler went on to observe:

Bottling pickles requires the highest dexterity. Blue- gowned, white-capped girls sit at long tables in rows transferring pickles from bowls to squat, thick glass bottles that signify vinegar and preserves to the mind of the retail customer. Each girl holds in her right hand a grooved stick which she thrusts into the bottle, then with her left hand she starts the pickle along the groove to the precise spot which, according to the model, it must occupy. The model jar shows how every pickle is to be placed. Bottles of olives and pickled cucumbers are planned to economize space, and bottles of mixed pickles are so arranged that each bit of color will be just right to make a harmonious whole. After the bottles are filled, they are inspected and compared with the model. The quick, sure touch with which the bottling girls follow the pattern and manage their tools is not learned in a day’s apprenticeship, but must be acquired by continued practice (quotation and photo from Elizabeth

Beardsley Butler, Women and the Trades: Pittsburgh, Lewis W. Hine 1907-1908, Vol. 1 from The Pittsburgh Survey [New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1909], pp. 35, 41). Bottling olives in Pittsburgh. 3

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 But today’s nostalgia for such cherished dishes should not obscure the challenge that immigrant families faced putting food on the table in Pittsburgh’s industrial districts in the early 20th FEEDING THE FAMILY Century. In 1907-8, the Russell Sage Foundation from New York City undertook a milestone sociological study in southwestern Pennsylvania, sending a team of trained IN HOMESTEAD, PENN.: investigators into the region to document the living conditions that workers faced. Known as The Pittsburgh Survey, these N VERVIEW FROM efforts resulted in the publication of a series of articles in A O Collier’s Magazine in 1908-9 and then a set of books between 1909 and 1914. One, Homestead: The Households of a Mill THE PITTSBURGH Town (1910), focused exclusively on daily living conditions in the community dominated by the Homestead Steel works, by 1907 one of the largest industrial plants of the United States SURVEY, 1907-8 Steel Corporation. The site had gained fame in 1892 as the location of the Homestead Steel Strike. By the early 1900s, it by Leslie Przybylek was the new home of many recent southern and eastern European immigrants who came to Homestead seeking work in Since 2013, Leslie Przybylek has been Senior the expanding mills.* Curator at the Senator John Heinz History Center in Pittsburgh, which is affiliated with the Smithsonian The study’s author, Margaret Byington, analyzed the factors Institution and is Pennsylvania’s largest history that shaped the well-being of the families who lived in museum. Her previous curatorial positions included Homestead. While she focused attention on everything from rent eight years at the Fort Smith Museum of History (Fort Smith, AR) and two years at the Crawford County Historical Society (Meadville, PA). She * Editor’s note: The composition of the workforce at Homestead holds degrees in art and art history from Gettysburg and at other U.S. Steel plants in Allegheny County as of March College and the Univ. of Delaware. 1907 is detailed in a series of charts in Appendix X of another volume in the Pittsburgh Survey series: John A. Fitch, The Steel Workers (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1910). The ew immigrants who made their way to western th workforce is described as 25.9% U.S.-born (overwhelmingly NPennsylvania’s steel towns in the early 20 Century white), 55.7% “Slav” (mostly , Poles, and Croatians), entered a forbidding industrial landscape that offered few 7.8% “Teuton” (mostly Hungarians and Germans), 6.0% “Celt” reminders of the homeland they left behind. Immigrant workers, (mostly Irish and English), and 4.6% “Other Races” (mostly especially new arrivals, spent long, back-breaking hours toiling Italians). Only 26.8% of the jobs held by the foreign-born for low pay, sometimes as little as 13½ cents an hour. workers were skilled or semi-skilled, compared to 73.5% for Competition for jobs was fierce and men sometimes agreed to the U.S.-born whites. Some 65.2% of the foreign-born workers work for even less. The Russell Sage Foundation’s 1914 were married, compared to 49.0% of the U.S.-born whites. publication Wage-Earning Pittsburgh documented one such Only about 48% of the Slavic and Italian workers could speak example. To secure a day’s work, a group of Croatian English, compared to more than 95% of the other foreign-born immigrants offered their services to a Pittsburgh employer for workers. just $1.20 a day. In response, the Superintendent reportedly exclaimed, “My God ... How can a man live in Pittsburgh on $1.20 per day?” The group’s foreman replied, “Give them rye , a herring, and beer, and they are all right.”1

Food offered one of the few familiar morsels of comfort available to immigrant workers and their families in mill communities such as Duquesne, Braddock, Pittsburgh’s South Side neighborhoods, and the most famous (or infamous) of the mill towns, Homestead. Over time, the ethnic dishes cooked, savored, and preserved through generations of tradition in these communities became part of Pittsburgh’s food heritage, best symbolized today by the or pirohy still sold in churches across the region and now popularized as smiling characters on pillows, posters, and even in a friendly “ Race” that occurs after the fifth inning of every Pirates’ baseball game at Pittsburgh’s PNC Park.2 A one‐room household for a worker and his family in Homestead, PA. All photos are by Lewis W. Hine, from Margaret Byington, Homestead: The Households of a Mill Town (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1910). 4

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

At noon‐time, workers sit with their buckets in an opening in the side‐wall of the steel mill in Homestead, 1909.

and canned , although aside from canned corn the commercially canned options were rarely specified. Able homemakers also did their own canning, , and making fruit preserves, which Byington specifically noted as a “special treat” for the mill to plumbing, Byington was especially interested in family worker’s dinner pail.7 budgets. How did people stretch their meager wages as far as possible? Because food comprised such a significant part of the In general, the family’s primary group were budget— from one third to nearly half— Byington gave it and the evening , “supper”. Breakfast, at least for an careful consideration, most notably in her Chapter V, “Table and English-speaking household making about $3.00 a day, was a Dinner Pail”. Her literal entry into the lives of Homestead filling menu focused on starches and protein: oatmeal and bread families made food difficult to ignore. Byington recalled: “I or potatoes, corncakes, eggs and , with sometimes a found it of little avail to start knocking on front doors. It was such as eggplant or rhubarb. Breakfast was nearly wise to go straight to the back door, which opened into the warm always hot, and eggs were practically a daily offering, not and cheerful . Here I was sure to find the housekeeper surprising given their economy as a protein source. Families busy preparing for the ever recurring meal, economically her enjoyed a more varied meal at supper, with a variety of meat or 3 most important task.” While Byington did not set out to record fish and multiple vegetables, and occasionally dessert. A sample specific recipes or ingredients, she observed what kinds of food menu might include lamb with , cucumber, families put on their tables and how daily meals were shaped by eggplant, beans, corn, coffee, bread and butter, and fruit.8 the rhythms of the mill. One note of caution: Byington’s access Weekday menus were relatively simple, and soups were to non-English speaking families was limited due to language common. The exception was Sunday, when extra meat was and the log-keeping aspects of her study. Nonetheless, her work added to the fare, typically a “roast”, which was most likely to contains enough details to paint a useful portrait of the food have been or .9 realities faced by Homestead’s working families. For lower-wage immigrant groups, meats and starches From the outset, Byington was impressed with what many dominated. When Byington recorded the food expenditures of a women could do and the care they took with meals even within Slavic family reliant on a wage of $9.90 a week, more than half their limited means. Certain foods, such as cabbage and of the family food budget of $5.19 went for the purchase of potatoes, dominated the table fare, not surprising given their meat, eggs, and starches such as bread, flour, and potatoes. A long history as staples in many of the eastern European groups mere 22¢ went for fruits and vegetables, most of that for fruit, customarily lumped together during this period as “”, possibly a reflection of the priority placed on making fruit 4 groups that predominated among Homestead’s newest arrivals. preserves for the father’s lunch. The weekly coffee supply The reliance on certain foods by some groups was reflected by required 76¢.10 In a similar study of Slavic groups drawn from a the local presence of at least one wholesale grocer who wider range of cities, sociologist Emily Greene Balch noted that specialized in the distribution of apples, onions, potatoes, and some Slavs economized by purchasing inexpensive soup meat 5 cabbage. But Byington’s work also clearly demonstrated that and bones, so much so that “it is hard for the butchers to get families in Homestead went beyond the stereotyped image to put bones enough to supply their demand.”11 Such use was also other vegetables and fruits on the table when they could afford likely in Homestead, where many women took pride in being them. She observed offerings such as spinach, sweet potatoes, able to transform cheaper cuts of meat into nutritious meals, and eggplant, turnips, red beets, beans, tomatoes, grapes, carrots, labor newspapers in the region (for those who could read) of- cucumbers, and rhubarb.6 The dinner table relied on both fresh continued on next page 5

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 20 HOMESTEAD continued from page 5 and sometimes as many as 20 extra men. Food offerings that fered suggestions to their readers about how to prepare cheaper could be prepared easily in large quantities with inexpensive cuts cuts, such as boiling, , then baking each piece of meat.12 of meat were an understandable choice made by many Byington noted that some Homestead residents opted instead for homemakers seeking to stretch the household income as far as 13 possible. One such offering was described as a “hot apple cake a largely vegetable diet. 21 and a stew of the cheapest cuts of meat.” Some women also Family buying habits also changed as people saved money allowed or expected boarders to add “extras” (e.g., to place and gained a more stable foothold in the community or special orders) for foods, for which they paid the additional cost. responded to tough times. In one instance, Byington observed While men could order vegetables, fruit, or milk, among other items, meat was the preferred “extra”, with pork the most how a woman responded to her husband’s loss of a job and 22 subsequent re-employment at a much lower rate by cutting back popular choice reflected in Byington’s data. This practice of on the purchase of meat and fruit and increasing the purchase of boarding attracted wide attention from other social scientists as ingredients such as eggs, cheese, milk, and turnips, allowing her well, most of it negative, and it fed into widely prevailing stereotypes that “Slavs” would “eat any kind of food that would to still put nutritious meals on the table despite the family’s 23 diminished means.14 Likewise, many families also supplemented keep the body and soul together.” There was once even an ugly purchased foods with home-grown produce. Quite a few raised rumor in one Pennsylvania steel town that lost dogs in the chickens, and Byington reported one Scotch family that community could be found on the tables of the new Slavic immigrants. But this dated to the 1880s, and Byington did not purchased a pig each winter destined to become salt pork and 24 ham for their larder.15 But the tenement housing arrangements report such slander by the time of her study. for many of the newest groups did not create conditions favorable for home gardening. Ultimately, Margaret Byington found much to admire about the abilities of Homestead’s wives and mothers to make their In contrast to breakfast and supper, the mid-day meal food dollars stretch as far as possible. While she criticized some (“dinner” in Byington’s study) varied significantly depending on of their strategies and found “unskilled” homemakers who relied who was eating it: the working man or the rest of the family at upon inefficient daily purchases of small amounts of meat, home. As the chapter title implied, the working man’s “dinner vegetables, and other food at the more expensive local grocery pail” dominated the attention of Homestead households. stores to be especially frustrating, she nonetheless also Although women had formerly been allowed to deliver hot recognized the true challenge that these women faced balancing meals to mills, at the time of the Russell Sage study this practice the realities of family needs against the limitations of industrial had been curtailed and most men carried cold food or soup. wages in Homestead. She was impressed by those who found While a long folk tradition told of mill workers carrying raw ways to put satisfying meals on the table every day, keep steaks to cook on the hot metal plates of their machines, workers’ dinner pails filled, and manage to provide a cheerful Byington did not witness this directly; she only mentioned it as a respite from the unrelenting demands of the mills. Byington story she heard from others.16 Dinner pail offerings were not wrote, “After watching the busy lives and the problems of these elaborate, but wives tried to make them as filling as possible, women, I came to believe that the woman who can keep her home healthful and attractive on $15 or less a week has in her often including soup, bread, and fruit or occasionally leftover 25 meat and vegetables with a rare cake for dessert. While that elements of genius.” That genius, replicated by thousands of might not sound like much, it was often substantially more than women in steel towns across the region for multiple generations, what was placed on the family table back home, which could be built the foundation of the ethnic food traditions cherished as minimal as “mush and milk with bread and molasses.”17 throughout the Pittsburgh metro area and the Monongahela While many Homestead families did not go to such extremes, Valley today. also offering modest lunchtime fare at home based on soup or leftovers from the evening before, Byington leveled some of her Endnotes harshest criticisms in this area, noting that while many women took great care with the needs of their men, their attention or 1. Paul Underwood Kellogg, Wage-Earning Pittsburgh knowledge of the needs of the children suffered in comparison. (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1914), p. 41. Similar accounts came from other industrial communities in the 2. Pierogis in Pittsburgh have become a media favorite; region, such as a field report from Johnstown that noted a see, e.g., Beth Kracklauer, “Touring Pittsburgh, One machinist’s wife who fed her six-month old on “soup, milk, Pierogi at a Time”, Wall Street Journal (May 18, coffee, and crackers” with later additions of foods such as 2016). and cabbage by nine months.18 It was not uncommon 3. Margaret Byington, Homestead: The Households of a for settlement workers to report area women and children living Mill Town (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, on “bread and ” so that the husband’s dinner pail would be 1910), p. 63. A digitized copy of the book is freely full.19 While such practices drew condemnation from accessible via Hathi Trust sociologists, they reflected the difficult compromise that many (https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006292158). families of low-ranking workers were forced to make to support 4. Thomas Čapek, The Slovaks of Hungary, Slavs and the efforts of the primary breadwinner. Panslavism (New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1906), p. 162; Edward Steiner, The Immigrant Tide, For some households, the meal situation was further Its Ebb and Flow (New York: Fleming Revell Co., complicated by the fact that many Slavic families made ends 1909), p. 204. Potatoes and cabbage, most notably in meet by taking in boarders. A “household” often included at the form of sauerkraut, formed the backbone of many least one or two additional adults beyond the immediate family, Hungarian, Polish, and Slovak holiday foods in the region, and still do. Such foods began garnering more 6

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

Slavic workers in front of their boarding house in Homestead, 1909.

press during the 1980s as the steel crash reached its “Passing of the Tin Dinner Pail, Old Time nadir. See, for example: “An Old-World Christmas”, Receptacle Seldom Seen in Cities Now”, Pittsburgh Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Dec. 17, 1980; Marilyn Press, Mar. 20, 1904. McDevitt Rubin, “Bobalky: A Slovak Tradition on 17. Byington, p. 64. Christmas Eve”, Pittsburgh Press, Dec. 23, 1981. 18. Kleinberg, p. 111; Emma Duke (United States 5. Advertisement for A. A. Hibler Wholesaler, R. L. Children’s Bureau), Infant Mortality: Results of a Polk & Co.’s Homestead Directory (Pittsburgh, PA: Field Study in Johnstown, Pa., Based on Births in R. L. Polk & Co., 1906), p. 12. One Calendar Year (Washington, DC: Govt. 6. Byington, pp. 63-64, 76, 78. Printing Office, 1915), pp. 83-84. 7. Byington, p. 64. 19. Kleinberg, p. 24. 8. Byington compiled her average “bill of fare” for 20. Byington, p. 138. For immigrant families, the low four days of the week, Monday through Thursday status of the husband as a mill laborer, rather than (pp. 63-64). one of the higher-ranking members of the skilled 9. Byington, p. 65. trades, also impacted the meager budget, and thus 10. Byington, p. 141. the prevalence of inexpensive ingredients such as 11. Emily Greene Balch, Our Slavic Fellow Citizens potatoes on the family table: see Kleinberg, p. 23. (New York: Charities Publication Committee, 21. Byington, p. 138. 1910), p. 363. 22. Byington, p. 139. The Slavic custom of hosting 12. S. J. Kleinberg, The Shadow of the Mills: Working- boarders was also observed by Emily Balch in her Class Families in Pittsburgh, 1870-1907 landmark 1910 study (footnote 11). She likewise (Pittsburgh: Univ. of Pittsburgh Press, 1989), p. 24. documented the practice of each man purchasing his 13. Byington, p. 154. own supply of food (p. 350). See also “Study of 14. Byington, pp. 77-78. Slavs by Emily G. Balch”, Pittsburgh Gazette 15. Byington, pp. 48, 74, 155. Times, Dec. 9, 1907. 16. Byington, p. 64. The tradition of steaks cooked on 23. Karel D. Bicha, “Hunkies: Stereotyping the Slavic the hot metal of mill machinery led to the use of the Immigrants, 1890-1920”, Journal of American term “Pittsburgh Rare” for meat charred on the Ethnic History, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Fall 1982), pp. 16-28. outside and very rare on the inside. See, for See also Frank Julian Warne, The Slav Invasion and example, Sarah Grey, “Pittsburgh Rare: A Culinary the Mine Workers (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, History of the Steel City”, Serious Eats, Mar. 7, 1904), p. 67. 2016. In the use of the old lunch pails by 1907- 24. Bicha, p. 23. See also John Bodnar, Immigration 1908, Homestead’s mill workers held to a practice and Industrialization: Ethnicity in an American Mill that had markedly diminished in Pittsburgh itself, Town, 1870-1940 (Pittsburgh: Univ. of Pittsburgh where downtown workers began to perceive Press, 1977), p. 78. carrying lunch in pails as an outdated practice; see 25. Byington, p. 79.

7

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 identities if they want to, and many options for displaying and performing those identities. PASCHA AND GOBS What people eat every day or on special holidays or public  ethnic events has usually been a safe way to express Slovak identity in America. Like all folk culture, foodways were subject to the forces of loss, preservation, change, revitalization, and adoption by the larger culture. This paper explores where Slovak SLOVAK IDENTITY foodways came from and how they fared in the U.S. as elements in the performance of ethnic identity. AND OODWAYS IN F Who Were the Slovak Immigrants?

PITTSBURGH The Slovak people were one of the Western Slavic tribes that migrated to south central Europe in the 6th Century. They settled in the northern arc of the Carpathian Mountains. After by Susan J. Kalčik briefly belonging to the Empire of Great Moravia, Slovaks were conquered by the Magyars (Hungarians) who dominated them Susan Kalčik’s parents were second-generation Slovak for a thousand years. In the 9th Century, Slovaks were Americans from Cleveland, OH, and Barnesboro, PA. Christianized by Saints Cyril and Methodius representing She earned BA and MA degrees in English at Miami Byzantine Orthodox Christianity, and they were Catholicized by University of Ohio, and did her graduate studies in German clergy. The Reformation and Counter Reformation left Folklore at the Univ. of Texas, Austin. She worked at Slovaks predominantly Catholic, along with approximately 15% the Smithsonian Institution’s Folklife Festival and Lutheran and a small number of Byzantine-Rite Catholics, Development Office, taught at Miami University and Calvinists, and Orthodox Christians. The majority of Slovaks in the Pennsylvania Highlands Community College, pre-immigration times lived on self-sufficient farms and in small worked on numerous public and community programs, villages, especially in the mountainous and less prosperous and helped found the Slovak Heritage Society of the eastern portions of the region. Laurel Highlands. Ms. Kalčik was awarded the first Johnstown Heritage Award presented by the Johnstown When Hungary achieved separation from the Habsburgs in Area Heritage Association, and the American Folklore the 1860s, Slovaks faced a relentless Magyarization process that Society’s Americo Paredes Prize for excellence in sought to remove all vestiges of Slovak identity, including the integrating scholarship and engagement with the . Some Slovaks emigrated to escape this people and communities one studies. She was the co- Hungarian repression of their cultural identity, but the vast author, with Susan Manos, of South Slavic Cooking: majority of them emigrated for more purely economic reasons. Croatian, Macedonian, Serbian, Slovenian (National The lack of industrialization and land reform in , which Park Service and Smithsonian Institution, 1981). She prevented landless Slovaks from earning a living, coincided with lives in the Pittsburgh area and is currently working on America’s period of massive industrialization. Chain migration a book about the Slovaks of Western Pennsylvania. emptied families and even whole villages as first young single men, then single women, and finally wives and children traveled to the U.S., mainly from eastern Slovakia (from which Rusyns hen Slovak immigrants entered the United States as part also emigrated). Some 500,000 people, or about 20% of the W of the great migration from Central and Eastern Europe entire Slovak population, left in the last half of the 19th Century. at the turn of the 20th Century, they brought with them an entire Their migration peaked in 1905, and ebbed in 1920. culture, including traditions, beliefs, religion, labor practices, music, dance, song, and foodways. Like all immigrants, they Young men were attracted to and recruited for the mills and would need to integrate the old and the new worlds, a mines of America’s industrial Northeast and Midwest, with complicated relationship. about half of the Slovaks settling in Pennsylvania. The 1990 census reports 1.8 million Americans of Slovak descent. Of Some of the Slovak immigrants gave up all ties to the past these, about 450,000 live in Pennsylvania, including a quarter in an effort to Americanize. Others made compromises, often million in the Pittsburgh area. The Slovaks also contributed large keeping some traditional aspects of tradition in the private parts numbers to the communities of Johnstown and Windber (located of their lives. Still other immigrants made few actual in the mountainous Laurel Highlands region southeast of adjustments. The first generation had relatively limited choices, Pittsburgh), and many smaller communities that started as coal and the second generation, the children born in America, faced patches. with discrimination and even bullying, generally strove to be as American as possible; when they had children, they tried to The Slovak American communities of Pennsylvania shield them from discrimination. But often the third and fourth centered at first around their work in steel mills and coal mines generations began a search for what had been lost, their Slovak and the clubs, organizations, and fraternal groups they created in identity. The Black Power movement encouraged other ethnic order to offer some protection for workers. As immigration groups to express pride in their ethnic heritage, and the fall of progressed, families were reunited or formed, and churches were communism in Slovakia made trips back to the homeland built. Educational institutions and social activities clustered inviting. Americans have the opportunity to express their ethnic around these. Since many American institutions were closed to 8

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

Slovak immigrants in Pittsburgh a century ago. Photos by Lewis W. Hine, from Paul Underwood Kellogg, Wage‐Earning Pittsburgh, Vol. 6 from The Pittsburgh Survey (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1914). the Slovak immigrants, they built their own, parallel institutions what they considered unequal status with the Czechs, split off and maintained their language, traditions, and foodways in the from the Czech Republic in July 1992 to form the Slovak private arena. Republic in a process called the Velvet Divorce. Slovakia today is located in the exact center of Europe, bordered by Austria, The Slovaks were not a well-known group. In local slang, Poland, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, and Hungary. It shares they were often lumped together with other Eastern European cultural and culinary traits with these countries and with the immigrants as “Hunkies” or “mill Hunkies”, a term apparently Rusyns of eastern Slovakia. derived from “Hun” and “Hungary”. Even in Europe, the history of shifting borders and rulers had left many Slovaks with more Slovak Foodways in Eastern Europe of a village identity than a national feeling. Further, U.S. immigration officers often assigned the Slovak immigrants the Slovak foods and the traditions that surround them can be identity of their nation of origin, either Hungarian or Austrian. traced to a time when the majority of Slovaks lived in Eastern Europe on farms or in small villages and were self-sufficient. Subsequent political and military events in Europe sparked Relative isolation and poverty, along with the short growing some smaller waves of Slovak immigration to the U.S. later in season in the mountains and mountain valleys in Eastern the 1900s. Freed from Hungarian rule as a result of World War Slovakia, limited the food choices that people had. 1, the Slovaks joined with the Czechs to form Czechoslovakia in 1918. From 1939 until the end of World War 2, Slovakia was an The foods had to withstand hot Summers and cold Winters. independent state under the forced protection of Nazi Germany. Sheep thrived in the mountain valleys and their milk was used to In 1945 Czechoslovakia was re-formed, and communists took make a number of cheeses, including the iconic cheese of control in 1948. When Slovaks emigrated to the U.S. from Slovakia, bryndza. Pork was the main meat and its products Czechoslovakia, they were often labeled “Czechs” or were included sausages such as klobása, a cousin of Polish kielbasa confused with the Slovenes. Slovaks, who had long chafed under continued on next page 9

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 SLOVAK PITTSBURGH continued from page 9 soups were thickened with a browned roux called zapraška [see recipe, page 18], smoked bacon, and lard. Less common (zaprashka), which could also be used as a gravy for some were beef, poultry, lamb, and goat. Also important were eggs dishes. It was especially important when meat was prohibited and milk, which was made into butter, cream, sour cream, (such as at Lent) or unavailable, as zapraška added more flavor buttermilk, and cheeses. There were a few local vegetables, but to the soup or dish of vegetables. Bread was also central to life the main one was cabbage, which grew well in the region and and considered sacred. My mother Ann Thur Kalčik believed could be eaten fresh or preserved for Winter as sauerkraut. that it was a sin to sit on a table, because bread is served on it.

Apples, plums, apricots, peaches, and cherries were The Slovaks had been used to providing their own dietary common tree fruits. Plums were cooked into a jam called lekvar sustenance. Out of economic need and a preference for fresh that was used in pastries and to fill pirohy, crescent-shaped food, the immigrants sought to replicate that system by planting dumplings similar to the Polish pierogi [see recipe, page 19]. gardens wherever possible. These were encouraged in many of Nuts and honey were used in pastries as well. Wild mushrooms the coal-patch towns by the mining companies, which ran were collected, dried, and used in soups. A few such as gardening contests and printed photos of the winners in local paprika and onions and garlic flavored dishes. Animal fats and newspapers. The gardens provided fresh vegetables to butter were used instead of cooking oils. The main drinks were supplement the immigrant families’ diets, and they were a thrifty milk, sour milk, and beer. alternative to markets likely to be unreachable especially in isolated mining towns. Some few immigrants were able to Wheat was important in the cuisine, but it was expensive: it achieve a common dream of owning their own farms, as is did not grow well in the eastern mountains and largely had to be chronicled in Robert J. Dvorchak’s Mike and Annie: From imported from the west. The wheat was ground into flour for Slovakia to America, the Dvorchak Family History (Blurb bread, dumplings, and . Potatoes did grow well in the Books, 2017). Similarly the maternal side of my family, the region and, as in other European countries, they provided a Thurs, purchased their own farm, recreating a self-sufficient cheap, almost complete food for the poor. They were usually lifestyle by raising fruits and vegetables, chickens, pigs, and a simply boiled for eating. But cooked and mashed potatoes were dairy herd. In addition, they provided dairy products to the coal- also mixed with flour to make potato that stretched the patch town of Marsteller (Moss Creek) in northern Cambria more precious wheat; this was used in a number of recipes for County. like lokše (lokshe), a thin potato and flour pancake. Rye bread was also common. One part of the cuisine in which wheat Food as an Emblem of Slovak American Heritage flour was used copiously was pastries. Slovaks had a seemingly endless repertoire of cookies and sweet rolls, most famously Slovakia today features a wider array of traditional Slovak koláče (kolache), a sweet dough spread with a nut or poppy-seed foodways than those brought to America. In fact, Slovak cuisine filling, rolled, baked, and served in slices. is now a pan- that uses many different ingredients and spices as well as industrially processed foods. Because of the isolation of the deep mountain valleys, there These Slovak dishes have been brought to the U.S. by modern developed and still exist regional variations in the recipes for cookbooks, the Internet, and by new immigrants and returning traditional Slovak dishes, their cultural significance, and how American tourists. Although bryndzove halušky, the simple dish and when they are served. And along with regional differences, of boiled potato-dough dumplings topped with bryndza, sheep’s Slovak cuisine was influenced by neighboring ethnic groups like cheese, is proudly honored as the Slovak , modern the Hungarians (notable for their use of paprika), Polish, Slovaks consider as old-fashioned much of what American Austrian, and the Rusyns. These are often most apparent along Slovaks think of as authentic food. “We don’t eat that old stuff borders, which shifted a great deal in the past. anymore”, many disappointed Slovak American tourists have been told when they were seeking out the dishes served by their Slovak Immigrant Foods grandmothers.

The foodways of eastern Slovakia that were brought by the But it is exactly some of those simple, traditional foods that immigrants to the U.S. were simple and inexpensive dishes Americans Slovaks still revel in. They are enjoyed in private typical of the old country, largely healthy, and fit well with the venues such as family dinners, or the in-group intimacy of economies of immigrant families. Three items that were church or club events. They are part of a family’s repertoire of common and almost obligatory on the Slovak immigrant’s table recipes, and are associated with special holidays like Easter and were potatoes, soup, and bread. The potato furnished the Christmas. And they are served at events to which the public is immigrants who worked in the steel mills and coal mines with an invited, such as Slovak Day at Kennywood in Pittsburgh, and inexpensive, versatile, and nutritious food, just as it had served Slavic Fest in Johnstown. There, ethnic display is the point of the agricultural lifestyle in the Old Country. In a quick search of the event. a few Slovak and Slovak American cookbooks, I found 35 recipes for traditional Slovak dishes using potatoes. Today in What are the foods used consciously or unconsciously to smaller villages in eastern Slovakia one can still see the front mark Slovak identity? The tent-covered “Slovak Kitchen” at yards of homes planted with potatoes. Slovak Day at Kennywood, an amusement park in Pittsburgh that has hosted this ethnic event for 95 years, advertises some of Many Slovaks in Pennsylvania began their dinners with the most iconic dishes: klobása sandwich with sauerkraut, pirohy soup. My Aunt Mary Thur served chicken soup with homemade (dough pockets stuffed with mashed potatoes and cheese) served noodles every Sunday, even in 90° Summer weather. Heavier with butter and onions, holubky (cabbage rolls stuffed with pork and , also called “pigs in a blanket”), and halušky (boiled 10

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

The Metropolitan of the American Carpatho‐ Russian Orthodox Diocese (Johnstown, PA) blesses family baskets for Easter.

dumplings or noodles, akin to German spätzle and served with chopped cabbage). The same items are on the menu at the Slovak Heritage Folk Festival held at the University of Pittsburgh each November. Čeregi or cheregie (fried and sugared knots of dough, also called Angel Wings) are the only pastry choice at the Kennywood event, but the Heritage Festival features a wide variety of pastries such as koláče, mentioned earlier. These same foods are served at countless other Slovak events in the U.S., and they are featured at some of the holidays and holy days as well as at family meals.

Such traditional dishes were originally prepared by the family cook and by members of church and fraternal organizations. They were often sold as fundraisers; a common saying is that many churches were built with pirohy money. In later years the church-made products also began to stand in for homemakers and working families who had become too busy to prepare the traditional foods, or no longer knew how. Today, even many churches are depleted of the little old Slovak ladies who can cook these foods.

Some time-saving adaptations have been created. For example, halušky was originally made with dumplings of wheat flour or a mixture of potato and flour, the finished dough either pressed through a form or cut with a knife into the boiling water [see two recipes on page 19]. Nowadays, the dumplings are often replaced with commercial noodles, which are sautéed with the chopped Christmas Eve (stedry vecer) is observed with a family meal cabbage and onions to prepare the dish much more quickly. The called the vilija. It is a meatless meal featuring mushroom or steaming, stuffing, and roasting of cabbage leaves for holubky is sauerkraut soup, pirohy, fish, wine, and fresh or stewed fruit. often replaced with a stuffed- made of ground beef, Bobálky, small balls of dough softened with hot milk or water rice, and sliced cabbage. The labor-intensive making, pinching, and covered with honey and poppy seeds or nuts, are also and boiling of dough for pirohy is replaced with pizza or lasagna served, as is koláče. The bobálky provoke many debates between made with mashed potatoes and cheese. In fact, some of these those who love them and those who hate them. The family also dishes can also be purchased commercially, such as the mass- shares a thin wafer dipped in honey to ensure a sweet year. Some market Mrs. T’s Pierogies and Costco’s pirohy and stuffed people like to slice apples horizontally to find a star that cabbage. portends a good year, or crack walnuts open to reveal a good future if the nuts inside are perfect. Christmas and Easter Foods At Easter, a round, rich, raised bread loaf called pascha Christmas and Easter are the two holidays, or holy days, that (paska) is the centerpiece of the meal (see photo and recipe in are almost universally celebrated by Slovak Americans with sidebar). A sumptuous array of the meat and dairy products prescribed foods and traditions. Most Slovak American traditionally prohibited during the fasting period of Lent is cookbooks will provide a separate section for the appropriate prepared, filling a basket that is taken to church and blessed recipes and traditions for these holidays, and they are featured in before or on Easter Sunday. The food is then shared at breakfast seasonal ethnic and church publications, sometimes exactly the with the family. Klobása, ham, bacon, and other meats go into same ones from year to year. the basket. So do eggs (kraslice decorated in traditional designs),

continued on next page 11

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

SLOVAK PITTSBURGH continued from page 11 bakers have claimed to have invented it, most likely it originated butter (sometimes presented in a lamb-shaped mold), and a in Germany and was brought by German immigrants to homemade cheese or custard called syrek or cirek [see recipe, Pennsylvania. “Gob” is originally a coal-mining term referring page 19]. These are spiced with chren, a pickled relish of ground to the non-coal matter or waste rock produced in mining and set beet and horseradish. Koláče and other baked goods and candies out in “gob piles”. The classic gob confection is made of are the sweet foods, which many Slovak Americans also give up chocolate cake and a white, cooked filling of milk, Crisco during Lent. A candle, flowers, and a bottle of wine can be shortening, sugar, flour, and vanilla. It is similar to the whoopee added. pie that is popular in Southeastern Pennsylvania and New England— although far superior to it, as anyone from Western There are other less common traditions, including the pre- Pennsylvania can tell you. The gob was well suited to working Lenten serving of fried foods such as pancakes. In Johnstown men carrying lunch pails into mines and mills, and to the women until a decade ago, students in the elementary school belonging filling those pails, because the cake frosting is on the inside to the St. Stephen Slovak Catholic Church enjoyed fried between the cake layers (rather than on the top and sides as with doughnuts made by Josephine Zahornec and other school cooks a regular slice of cake), so it does not stick to the waxed paper or there. This tradition and others have generally faded. Like so other wrapping. Standard variations include banana, peanut many other Catholic churches, St. Stephen’s was merged with butter, and pumpkin flavors, and in recent years creative bakers other nearby churches and renamed. One reason given was that have unleashed a wide variety of exotic flavors of gobs and the Catholic Church is no longer in the business of promoting fillings. At the annual Gob Fest, held on National Gob Day at ethnic identity, at least in this diocese. Johnstown’s Galleria Mall for the ninth time in Spring 2019, flavors included cherry chip, mint, orange raspberry, birthday The regional differences among Slovak immigrants cake, and even gluten-free and the spurious square gob. Regional contributed to great variation in the recipes of such traditional bakeries, restaurants, and commercial bakeries offer gobs, and dishes. An important part of Slovak American food customs is local cooks prepare gobs and gob cakes, sometimes using time- the endless debates over the authentic way to prepare a particular savers such as cake mixes. and seemingly simple dish. At holiday celebrations, family gatherings, and Slovak language classes, people will argue, for Cookbooks and Other Resources example, about the proper soup for Christmas Eve: sauerkraut, potato, or mushroom? These discussions are punctuated by The wonderful first- and second-generation Slovak women claims such as, “My mother/grandmother made it this way.” who prepared and preserved traditional foods for families and Even within families the debates rage. Each Christmas Eve, my community groups made another major contribution to the Aunt Sue Jonav would insist that my grandmother Susanna Thur preservation of Slovak foodways: they wrote cookbooks. had never served fish at the vilija; my mother would come to the defense of the fish, perhaps embarrassed that her family might Some of these were informal compilations of the favorite have been too poor to afford it. recipes of a particular cook or family; for instance, Peter L. Jurash’s Mother’s Favorite Recipes from Czechoslovakia Cross-Ethnic Traditions (Washington, DC, 1968) is a tribute to his mother Eva. Others were produced by major Slovak women’s organizations, Slovak Americans have come to share certain foods and including The Anniversary Slovak-American Cook Book traditions with their neighbors of varying ethnic backgrounds in (Chicago, 1952; frequently reprinted) from the First Catholic Western Pennsylvania, and some of these could be considered Slovak Ladies Association; The Slovak Catholic Sokol Cookbook regional dishes and practices. One example is the eating of pork (Passaic, NJ, 1964, 1976) from the Sokol organization (an and sauerkraut on New Year’s Day for good luck throughout the Olympics-style youth movement that arose in the Austro- new year. Two others that are ubiquitous are the pirohy and the Hungarian Empire and was brought by immigrants to the U.S.); gob. and The Slovak World Congress Cookbook (Toronto, 1995), edited by Anne Zvara Sarosy and Sandra Sarosy Duve. The pirohy (pierogi in Polish) is a boiled, stuffed crescent of dough whose traditional fillings include mashed potato and Slovak cooks also contributed to church and community cheese, sautéed cabbage, sauerkraut, and lekvar (plum jam). cookbooks, such as The Johnstown Area Heritage Association Contemporary cooks and restaurants in our region have Cookbook: Ethnic Recipes of Johnstown (Johnstown, PA, 1990), expanded the repertoire to include a wide variety of savory and edited by Henry Boni; Sharing Our Pride: Saint Stephen’s sweet and fillings, such as corn chowder pierogis, Parish 1891-1991 (Johnstown, PA, 1991) from the St. Stephen’s Nutella pierogis, Buffalo chicken pierogis, and pierogis sautéed Slovak Catholic Church; and the American Carpatho-Russian with broccoli, tomatoes, and garlic . The annual Steel Cookbook (Johnstown, PA, 2000) from the Christ the Saviour Valley Pierogie Festival And Cook Off is a fundraising event for Cathedral. Rainbow Kitchen Community Services, a non-profit organization providing anti-hunger and child care programs for These traditional Slovak American resources have been residents in the Monongahela River Valley. supplemented in recent years by cookbooks with a wider range of recipes, written in English by Slovaks or contemporary The gob is a kind of hybrid cake/cookie consisting of two Slovak immigrants. An example is Best of Slovak Cooking by cookie-shaped pieces of cake sandwiched together with a thick, Sylvia and John Lorince. Sylvia was born in Bratislava (the sweet frosting (see photo and recipe in sidebar). While many capital of Slovakia) and currently lives in Bradfordwoods, PA. Otilia’s Slovak Kitchen: A Collection of Recipes (Second edi- 12

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 tion, 2018) was written and self-published by Otilia Golis, who Slovak foodways traveled from Europe with the immigrants, was born and raised in Košice, Slovakia, and moved to and not only sustained them in America but also served as a Pittsburgh with her American husband. There are also Slovak reminder of who they were— and now, of who they are. The cookbooks translated into English, such as one by Josef Rybár, dishes and traditions described here mark, consciously or Martin Kállay, and Eva Budjačová, Slovak Cooking (Bratislava, unconsciously, in public or private, their Slovak and regional 2000). Finally, there are some good Internet resources such as identities.  [email protected].

Pascha loaf and other items in a family’s basket for Easter.

Pascha () Gobs

From Ann Thur Kalčik, mother of Susan Kalčik From Mrs. Mary Minahan, Christ the Saviour Cathedral, Johnstown, PA 1 cake of yeast ½ cup lukewarm water For the cakes: ½ cup margarine, melted 1 cup lukewarm milk  Mix together 2 cups sugar, 2 eggs, ½ cup Crisco. 2 eggs, beaten 4 cups all-purpose flour  Add 1 cup sour milk, 1 cup boiling water, 1 teaspoon 1 teaspoon salt vanilla ¼ cup sugar  Sift together and add 4 cups flour, ½ teaspoon Dissolve yeast in lukewarm water; set aside until baking powder, ½ cup cocoa, 2 teaspoons baking bubbly. Mix together melted margarine, warm milk, and soda, pinch of salt. eggs. In a large mixing bowl, combine and mix flour, salt, and sugar. Make a well in the flour mixture. Add  Mix and drop by tablespoons onto ungreased cookie milk and yeast mixture; mix well. Knead until smooth sheets and bake for 5 minutes at 450° F. and elastic, adding flour if necessary. Cover and let rise 1 hour. Punch down, then let rise another hour. Turn For the filling: dough out on a floured cloth; divide, knead slightly, and shape into a large loaf or two small ones. Place into oiled  Cook until thick 5 tablespoons flour in 1 cup milk. round pans. Brush top(s) with melted butter. Cover and Let cool. let rise again until doubled. Bake at 350° F. for 40-50 minutes, depending on size of loaf. Remove from pan(s)  Mix with 1 cup Crisco or oleo (margarine), 1 cup and let cool. powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla. Mix together NOTE: A small piece of the dough can be used to and spread between pairs of cakes. form a cross or braid to decorate the loaf before it is buttered and left to rise the last time.

13

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019 lovingly packed for school or work, making sweets for the holidays. After a generation or two you might not understand OUNGSTOWN EEPS the old language, but you’ll surely know plenty of words for Y K food!

UP THE TRADITIONAL In places like Youngstown and Cleveland in Ohio, or Pittsburgh and Hazelton in Pennsylvania— which were heavily settled by newly-American Slovaks between 1880 and 1920— SLOVAK VILIJA DINNER words like kolač, pirohy, holubky, klobási, and halušky have survived for generations, although their spellings might have by Loretta A. Ekoniak changed. Even when English terms like “stuffed cabbage” or “nut roll” are used instead, or when a few traditional ingredients from Loretta Ekoniak of Canfield, OH, is the grandchild the Old Country have been replaced with others more easily of Slovak immigrants and a promoter of Eastern found in Midwestern supermarkets, the food yet survives. I can European cultural traditions. She is President of assure you that you will find many of these foods, no matter how the American Slovak Cultural Association of the you spell them now, in the local grocery stores and bakeries and Mahoning Valley and an organizer of its annual at Slavic churches, including Slovak, Polish, Croatian, etc. These Vilija Christmas Eve holy supper. Ms. Ekoniak churches and groups still sell many of these wonderful foods for coauthored, with Susan J. Summers, the book fundraisers, especially around the holidays. Slovaks of the Greater Mahoning Valley (Arcadia Books, 2011), which includes photos and stories of One of the most treasured Slovak meals at Christmas time is more than 100 local families. She holds BS, BSEd, the Vilija Dinner (pronounced vee-lee-yah). This special dinner is and MEd degrees from Youngstown State Univ. filled with specific customs, foods, and religious symbolism. and has retired from her teaching career. Even here in America many of the traditions are still carried on in American-Slovak homes, and many Slovak-founded churches and mmigrants to America bring with them a gift: a personal Slovak cultural organizations organize Vilija dinners each Ihistory rich with the culture and customs of their native land. December. They pass this gift to their children, who pass it on to their children; but with each successive generation much is lost to The word Vilija, which means Vigil, refers to the Christmas integration and assimilation, even while new customs and culture Eve dinner served in the villages of eastern Slovakia as a meatless are created from the same. There is, however, at least one meal. In western Slovakia the term Štedrý Večer (Generous treasured thing that better resists the pressure to conform, to fit in, Evening, pronounced SHTEH-dree VEH-chair) is more to discard the old fashions for the fads: namely, the food customs. frequently used, and various meats are included. Such regional Perhaps this is because of food’s close association with love of dietary differences arose because western Slovakia was family— the apron-strings at the oven, dinners around the table, historically more influenced by German Lutherans, while eastern Slovakia was more influenced by Roman and Byzantine Catholics and Eastern Orthodox. In addition, eastern Slovakia is very mountainous; its villages were rather isolated before the era in which roads and train tracks connected them. There are even some village to village variations in food customs, but overall, the basic Vilija celebration and meal remained fairly consistent throughout the region.

This photo from roughly a century ago shows women volunteers with the Immanuel Slovak Evangelical Lutheran Church. From left to right are (back row) Zuzanna Kovach, Kathryn Leporis, Anna Pagac, Suzanna Payer, and Anna Puhalla; (front row) Annie Kovach, Mike Kovach, and Milan Pagac.

Photo from Mark Miller (Concordia Lutheran Church, Youngstown, OH) via Loretta A. Ekoniak and Susan J. Summers, Slovaks of the Greater Mahoning Valley (Arcadia Books, 2011).

14

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

An Annual Vilija Dinner in Youngstown

The majority of Slovak immigrants in the Youngstown and Mahoning Valley area are descended from people who emigrated from eastern Slovakia, specifically from the old Hungarian counties of Spiš, Šariš, and Zemplin. There are close to 20 churches in the area, of various denominations, that were established by immigrants of Slovak descent, not counting those established by the Carpatho-Rusyn immigrants who also came from what is now part of Slovakia. In addition to the churches there are at least six Slovak fraternal organizations that were represented (and still are) here, and some of the Slovak cultural clubs and associations also still exist. Many of these churches and organizations formerly, and a number of them still currently, organize Vilija Dinners during December. These, of course, are  fish, traditionally kapor (carp), but usually cod or haddock large public events as opposed to the intimate family gatherings here in the U.S. traditionally held on Christmas Eve.  pirohy (akin to the Polish pierogi), pockets of dough stuffed with mashed potatoes and cheese and served with As an example, our American Slovak Cultural Association of browned butter and onions (see recipe, page 19) the Mahoning Valley (ASCA) holds an annual Vilija Dinner on  green peas the second Sunday of December, and we average between 200  kolače, which are nut-roll pastries and 250 attendees. This dinner has been held in Youngstown by  fresh apples. the ASCA since 1992; before that it was presented by St.

Matthias Roman Catholic Parish, who had taken it over from the Along with the traditional foods, the dinner also includes Youngstown Slovak Catholic Sokol organization that first entertainment (usually a folk-dance group or a band that plays established this Vilija celebration in 1971. That makes 48 years Slovak folk music), presentation of the two scholarships that we that the dinner has been held on the south side of Youngstown! award each year to deserving students, and raffles to raise funds

for the scholarships (a gift-basket raffle and a 50/50 raffle, in Our annual Vilija Dinner starts with a welcome, an opening which the winner keeps 50% of the raffle sales). The dinner itself prayer, the Pledge of Allegiance and singing of the American and is basically break-even: since we organize the event mainly to Slovak national anthems, followed by a traditional Slovak Vinš keep this wonderful tradition alive, we purposely keep the price (Christmas Wish). The menu consists of very traditional foods: as low as possible.  oplátky, an unleavened communion-type wafer stamped

with a Christmas scene, which can be dipped in honey A Traditional Family Vilija in Slovakia  bobálky, little baked dough balls steamed or moistened and coated in honey, then rolled in or served coated Here is the way that a Vilija dinner would be carried out in a in browned butter and mixed with fried sweet cabbage (see traditional family context in Slovakia. recipe on next page)  kapustnica, a type of mushroom soup usually with It begins when the first star appears in the sky on Christmas sauerkraut (see recipe on next page) eve. The youngest child is often told to watch for its appearance

continued on next page 15

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

Kapustnica with mushrooms and orzo.

Kapustnica (Christmas Eve Soup)

From Loretta Ekoniak

Here, I have included several ways to make Bobálky (Sweet Dough Balls) it and several variations. Hopefully one will be similar to your Christmas memories! From Loretta Ekoniak 1. You can use any type of mushroom, called huby in Bobálky at home was always made with fresh Slovak (keep the liquid for use in the soup): bread dough, but today, one can use frozen sweet  1 lb. fresh mushrooms, cleaned, cut, and cooked bread roll dough from the supermarket. Either in about 1 quart water, OR prepare or buy about 1 pound of bread dough.  3 oz. dried mushrooms soaked overnight, OR  one 8-oz. can of mushroom pieces. 1. Pinch off portions of the bread dough to form oblong 2. Make a zapraška (roux) with 1 Tbsp. butter and 1 pieces about 1 inch in diameter. Tbsp. flour, frying until golden brown (be careful not to 2. Place on a greased cookie sheet, set in a warm burn it). location, and let rise for 15 minutes. 3. With the zapraška still in the pan on the heat, slowly stir 3. Bake at 375° F. for 15 minutes or until lightly in about 1 qt. of liquid (the cooking water, the soaking browned. When cool, break the bread pieces in half water, or the liquid from the canned mushrooms). and place in a colander. 4. Add in the mushrooms, along with: 4. Cook 1½ cups of ground poppy seed in ¾ cup of  sauerkraut juice to taste water or milk for 10 minutes, stirring in 1 cup of  ½ cup or so of sauerkraut honey (more or less, according to how sweet you want the bobálky to be).  vinegar to taste. 5. Pour about 2 cups of boiling water over the bread 5. Then you vary it according to taste and memory! You pieces in the colander, letting the water drain quickly can add cooked noodles— any small such as star- (as an alternative, steam the pieces until slightly shaped, orzo, or egg flakes. Some people add lentils or softened). beans— I like to use Great Northern beans. Actually, 6. Remove the bread pieces to a plate or bowl. Pour the this is a very good soup with just the noodles and beans poppy seed/ honey syrup over them. Mix well and for those who do not like mushrooms (like my son!). you have bobálky.

Can be served either warm or cooled from the refrigerator. SLOVAK YOUNGSTOWN continued from page 11 It was traditional to have bobálky every Christmas and New (possibly this was a means to keep the little ones out of the way Year. while the adults were preparing everything!). Frequently the dinner table is set with the table cloth laid over straw, or else straw is Editor’s note: Traditionally, after the bread pieces were placed under the table, to remind us that the Baby Jesus was born baked they were allowed to become very dry and hard for in a stable. Often, an empty place is left at the table to remind us of storage and use over the Winter. When ready to use, the those who couldn’t share this meal with us, or who died the pieces were re-softened by pouring boiling water over previous year and were thought to return to visit during the them (step 5 above). Christmas season, or to welcome a traveler seeking shelter as with the Holy Family.

16

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

The parents or the oldest family member lead everyone to the Traditionally the main course in eastern Slovakia is fish, table with a lit candle representing the Christ Child. The father or since the meal is meatless (in western Slovakia there can also be mother begins with a blessing and a prayer. Then the father sausage or ham). The fish, carp, is purchased live at the Christmas breaks the oplatky, which have been baked and blessed on St. markets and kept in the family bathtub until it is killed and Lucy’s feast day (Dec. 13) and distributed to the villagers ahead prepared on Christmas Eve. (I’ve been told that it wasn’t unusual of time in case snowy mountain passes delay the delivery. The for the young children to begin thinking of it as a pet, and poor father breaks off a piece of the wafer, and the rest is passed from dad had to go buy fillets instead for the Vilija dinner!) Pirohy are oldest to youngest for each to break off a piece. The pieces of often served, and peas are eaten as an assurance of a prosperous wafer are then dipped in or spread with honey. The mother or year. In some regions a 12-course meal is traditional to represent father might also dip their thumb in honey and make a sign of the the 12 apostles, similar to what is done in Italy. Pagač (pagach), a cross on each person’s forehead, reminding them to keep Christ stuffed dough, is also common. Stewed prunes are served in some first in all things, wishing them a sweet disposition through the areas, always in pairs, which is thought to ensure that everyone coming year, and asking them to remember the sweetness of life. returns for the next Christmas. This is also why no one is allowed to leave the table until everyone is finished. Typically, the meal itself starts with some type of mushroom soup, usually with sauerkraut and, depending on the region, either Toasts are made with homemade wines or slivovica (a plum beans, dried plums, or small bits of . Other areas instead brandy), and cheers of Na zdravie! (To your health!). In some have a pea soup or a cream soup. In western Slovakia, klobása regions an apple is cut horizontally across, and if a full star is (see recipe, page 18), a meat sausage akin to Polish kielbasa, visible at the core, then it’s a sign of a good year ahead. In other might be added to the soup. The sourness in many versions of the regions, a walnut is split open, and if all of the sections are full Vilija soup is a reminder that life is sometimes bitter. and plump then it foretells good times ahead.

The next course is often the poppy seed-covered bobálky, After dinner is finished and everything is cleaned up, the also called opekance. Dry poppy seed might be scattered in the family dresses warmly and walks together through the village, doorways to keep the devil out, the idea being that he has to stop joining their friends and neighbors on the way to Midnight Mass. and pick up all of the poppy seeds first. Veselé Vianoce! (Merry Christmas!)

17

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

MORE RECIPES OF CZECH AND SLOVAK HERITAGE

The first recipe below, for the Czech version of kolachy, was one of several that were sent to us by CHAA member Pam Dishman of La Porte, IN. It is from “Kitchen Shelf”, a recipe exchange column in a late 1960s or early 1970s issue of the magazine Steel Labor (United Steel Workers of America, Pittsburgh, PA). The other six recipes are selected from the chapter “Slovaks” in Daniel A. Karaczun, ed., Out of This Kitchen: A History of the Ethnic Groups and Their Foods in the Steel Valley, 2nd ed. (Pittsburgh, PA: Publassist, 2010).

Bohemian Kolachy Slovak Homemade Kolbasi (Klobási)

Contributed by Mrs. Pete A. Herrera of Silver City, NM Contributed by Stephen M. Vamos of Whitaker, PA, who worked for U.S. Steel for 36 years. He remembers his For the Dough: family making sausage when he was six years old in

3 cups all-purpose flour ¼ cup soft butter 1927, and he still owns the meat grinder and other ¾ cup milk, scalded ¼ cup sugar kitchen tools that his parents brought with them from the 1 reg. cake compressed ½ tsp. salt old country for this purpose:

yeast or 1 pkg. dry yeast 1 egg yolk In those days, a couple of families would go in ¼ cup lukewarm water ½ tsp. grated lemon rind together and purchase a pig from someone’s farm or 1 tsp. sugar 1 pkg. powdered sugar the slaughter house. The cleaning and distributing of Sift flour and measure it. Scald milk and cool to lukewarm. the pig was a festive event. First they’d burn the hair Crumble compressed yeast or turn dry yeast into lukewarm off of the pig and scrape the skin with a sharp knife. water, stir in one teaspoon sugar and let soften 10 minutes. Every single part of the pig was used for some dish, In a three-quart mixing bowl, cream butter, add sugar, salt, including the feet, blood, and organs. The children egg yolk and lemon rind. Beat until smooth. Stir in yeast gathered around for a special treat— a piece of the mixture, then add the flour and milk alternately in three pig’s ear or tail to chew on! Someone in the portions, stirring and beating after each to form a smooth, neighborhood usually had a smokehouse and they’d soft dough. Round up dough and return to washed and let you store your meat in there if your family didn’t greased bowl, turning once to bring greased side up. Cover have one. and let rise in warm place until double (about two hours). Turn out on lightly floured board or pastry cloth. Roll out 5 lbs. pork butts 1 tsp. pepper one-fourth inch thick. Cut out with a 2½-inch biscuit cutter 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped casings, enough to use and place on a greased cookie sheet. Let rest 10 minutes, 2 Tbsp. salt up prepared meat then make wide, deep indentation in center of each round with greased thumb. Fill with one tablespoon desired Grind meat in coarse grinder and mix well with other Kolachy filling. Let rise in warm place until a little more ingredients. Stuff cleaned casings with meat mixture. than double (about 15 minutes). Bake in a moderately hot Some local markets carry cleaned, prepackaged casings oven (400° F.) 15 to 20 minutes. Remove to cake rack, and around the Easter season. Put in smokehouse and smoke while warm sprinkle with powdered sugar. daily for about a week, using hickory wood. A temporary smokehouse can be made from a large tin For cottage cheese filling: drum.

½ lb. creamed cottage 1 Tbsp. melted butter cheese ⅛ tsp. mace 2 egg yolks, beaten Dash of salt 2 Tbsp. sugar ¼ cup golden raisins Slovak Kochanina (Jellied Pigs Feet)

Wash raisins and turn into colander. Cover, place over Contributed by Adele Vamos of Munhall, PA boiling water and let steam for five minutes. Cool. Combine all ingredients and mix just enough to blend 3 lbs. pigs feet, each chopped ⅛ tsp. pepper well. in half lengthwise ¼ tsp. sweet paprika, 1 Tbsp. salt optional For apricot filling: water 2 cloves garlic

½ lb. dried apricots 1½ cups water Singe pigs feet, wash and boil. Pour off water. Add ⅓ cup sugar 1 Tbsp. butter fresh water, just enough to cover. Bring to boiling Wash apricots quickly in cold water. Place in saucepan point, skim if necessary. Simmer slowly. Add the with sugar and water, heat to boiling, reduce heat, seasonings. Cook until bones fall apart, about 4 to 5 cover and simmer 45 minutes. When cool, press fruit hours. Pour into soup plates and let stand overnight in a and juice though a food mill or coarse sieve. Stir in cool place. butter. Makes 1½ cups purée.

18

REPAST VOLUME XXXV, NUMBER 3 SUMMER 2019

Slovak Pirohy Slovak Haluski (Dumplings)

Contributed by Mrs. Margaret Majercik Contributed by Emilia Ivaska

1 cup flour 4-5 Tbsp. water 2 eggs 2 cups flour 1 egg 2-3 Tbsp. butter ½ cup cold water boiling water pinch of salt 1 tsp. salt

Combine all ingredients to make a medium soft Break eggs into a bowl, add cold water, salt, and mix dough. Knead well. Roll dough out thin and cut into together. Add enough flour to make a medium-stiff dough. 2-inch squares. Put a little of any desired filling on Let it sit while the water comes to boil. Place dough on a each square and fold to form a triangle. Pinch edges small paddle-type board, cut off small pieces with table together to keep the filling in. Drop into boiling knife, dropping into boiling water. Boil gently until noodle- salted water and cook until all rise to top. Cook like dumplings rise to top of water. Cook for 5 minutes additional 5 minutes. Drain and place in serving covered, but watch to keep it from boiling over. Remove bowl. Brown some additional butter and pour over from boiling water with sieve and blanch with cold water. cooked pirohy. Mix lightly until all are buttered. Place in bowl with a little butter and mix lightly. Serve hot.

For cottage cheese filling: Combine ½ cup dry Slovak Bundurcov Haluski cottage cheese, 1 egg yolk, 1 Tbsp. sugar. (Potato Dumplings) For sauerkraut filling: Drain and wash kraut, and parboil about 10 minutes. Drain and squeeze dry. The woman who submitted this recipe chose to remain Sauté 1 chopped medium onion in butter. Add anonymous. Born in 1917 on Hays Lane in Munhall, PA, sauerkraut and salt to taste, and brown. she worked in the mills in the early 1940s. “I started out on

For potato filling: Blend together 1 potato (cooked the labor gang pitching bricks from boxcars.” The bricks and mashed), salt, and grated yellow cheese. were passed from person to person, hand to hand, stacked, and later used to replace the burned-out bricks in the open- hearth furnace.

She worked three shifts, six days a week, and walked from Slovak Cirek (Easter Cheese) her Munhall home— including a flight of 75 steps each way— to get to her job. She still lives in her family’s home, Contributed by Adele Vamos of Munhall, PA. She writes: which is over 100 years old.

You must have extreme patience in making this dish. It takes It was an experience and at the same time it was a about one hour to heat slowly and cook. This recipe has a fearful job because once the furnace would burn out, rather bland but sweet taste indicative of the moderation that different groups of people would come and clean Christians should have in all things. My childhood memories out the furnace. They would let the furnace cool and of Cirek include the many households in Whitaker with Cirek once it cooled they were only allowed in there for a balls hanging [to dry] outside on clotheslines at Easter time. few minutes. The bricks would burn down and they When I saw my baba’s [grandmother’s] Cirek hanging out on wouldn’t work anymore. The fire was all gas and it the line or from the spigot in the bathtub, I knew we’d be was under a big pot. That’s what it was like. I taking the Easter basket to church for the traditional blessing always said that when I die I’ll never go to hell of the baskets on Holy Saturday. because I was in hell for four years.

1 doz. eggs, break yolks but 1 qt. milk During her years in the mill, she said the cafeteria do not beat ½ cup sugar employed a Slovak cook. Although she did not eat lunch at 1-2 tsp. vanilla extract the cafeteria, she did know that they served a lot of haluski and soups such as bean or mushroom. Combine all ingredients in a white enamel pan. Cook over medium to low heat, stirring constantly, until eggs curdle 2 cups raw potatoes 1 tsp. salt and form a heavy curd. Pour mixture into a colander that is 2 medium eggs 1 cup flour (approx.) lined with several layers of cheesecloth or a cotton dish- towel. Once drained, pick it up, cheesecloth and all, and Finely grate potatoes. Add egg, salt, flour. Mix well to create twist the top part of the cloth tight until you’ve formed a a pasty dough. Add a little water if dough is too pasty.

ball. Tightly tie the open end with string, keeping the string Take a handful of dough, place it on a plate and chip off very close to the top of the ball. Mixture will be very hot so pieces of dough with the tip of a teaspoon into a pot of be careful. Hang over the sink or on a clothesline until cool. boiling water. You can test to see if they are done by cooling Once it is cooled and formed, remove cheesecloth, wrap and and tasting one or when dough takes on a shiny appearance. refrigerate. Serve cold, sliced or cubed, with ham and Veal Rinse in hot water, drain. Mix lightly with browned butter or Loaf (pulnina). margarine, and dry cottage cheese and sauerkraut.

19

CHAA CALENDAR

(Except where noted, programs are scheduled for 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. and are held at the Ann Arbor District Library – Malletts Creek Branch, 3090 E. Eisenhower Parkway.)

Sunday, September 15, 2019 On the Back Burner: We welcome ideas and Shachar M. Pinsker, Prof. of Judaic Studies and submissions from all readers of Repast, including Middle East Studies, Univ. of Michigan, for the following planned future issues. Suggestions discusses his book, A Rich Brew: How Cafés Created Modern Jewish Culture for future themes are also welcome.  Fall 2019: Culinary Excursions (Part 2)  Winter and Spring 2020: Immigrant Foods of Steel Country (Parts 2-3)

REPAST 1044 GREENHILLS DRIVE ANN ARBOR, MI 48105-2722

Culinary Historians of Ann Arbor Volume XXXV, Number 3, Summer 2019

First Class